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FILE - In this Jan. 21, 2010 file photo, passengers walk past a Delta Airlines 747 aircraft in McNamara Terminal at Detroit Metropolitan Wayne County Airport in Romulus, Mich. Reacting to public outcry, Delta said Wednesday, June 8, 2011, it will allow members of the military to check four bags for free. The news came after two Army soldiers returning from Afghanistan complained in an online video that Delta charged their unit a total of $2,800 when some of them checked a fourth bag.(AP Photo/Paul Sancya, file)

How misinformation spread about Delta, Jews and flights to Saudi Arabia

An incendiary news story about Delta Air Lines flew quickly around the Internet this week. It left a vapor trail of misinformation and confusion as websites eagerly posted it without thoroughly checking the facts, while Delta was slow to adequately respond.

In January, Delta issued what was then a non-controversial news release, publicizing a new alliance with Saudi Arabian Airlines. Delta announced that the government-owned carrier will become a member of SkyTeam in 2012, joining more than a dozen other airlines in the global network that allows passengers to more easily transfer among each others’ flights. (Delta doesn’t control SkyTeam, but did support Saudi Arabian’s addition to it.)

The news attracted little attention until this week, when it exploded online in an especially inflammatory way. Several news stories reported that because of the new alliance, Delta would not allow Jewish passengers on flights to Saudi Arabia. Some stories also suggested that Delta customers may be prohibited from carrying religious items except those related to Islam.

Yet only a few hours after the stories were posted, some of the media organizations and websites began to walk them back. USA Today, which prominently displayed the story on its site Thursday afternoon, removed it and replaced it with a cryptic message that “an early version of this story contained incomplete information.” The Village Voice kept the original story online, but added a parenthetical note that it may be “just a huge rumor.”

Incomplete stories obscure complicated facts

So what’s the “complete” information? And how much of the story is a rumor? The answer is more complicated than most of the news stories let on.

First, it’s important to emphasize that Delta itself doesn’t fly to Saudi Arabia and has no plans to do so. When Saudi Arabian Airlines joins SkyTeam next year, Delta will sell tickets for the Middle Eastern carrier and allow easier connections between the two airlines, but the actual flights will not be on Delta planes. Several other U.S. airlines -- such as United, American, and US Airways -- already participate in similar alliances with overseas carriers that serve Saudi Arabia.

Second, it’s undisputable that Jews -- especially those with Israeli passports -- often face obstacles traveling to Arab countries, including being hassled and detained -- but it’s overstating the situation to speak of “the banning of Jews.” The U.S. State Department notes that, “There have been reports by U.S. citizens that they were refused a Saudi visa because their passports reflected travel to Israel or indicated that they were born in Israel.”

Third, the reports of banned Bibles are part fact and part hyperbole. It is indeed common practice for non-Islamic religious items to be confiscated from travelers entering Saudi Arabia. (As late as 2007, the Saudi Arabian Airlines website noted that such items as Bibles, crucifixes, and Stars of David could not be brought into the country.)

But it’s not accurate to suggest that Delta is outlawing Bibles on its flights. If a passenger’s religious item is confiscated, it’s because a Saudi Arabian government official takes it after the visitor lands in that country, not because Delta seizes it in Cincinnati or Salt Lake City. And, of course, Saudi Arabia’s narrow-minded ban applies regardless of what airline a passenger arrives on.

A fast moving story and a passive response

This week’s explosion of news stories about Delta’s Saudi alliance apparently was sparked by the controversial conservative website WorldNetDaily, which is best known for relentlessly pushing discredited allegations about President Obama’s birth certificate.

In a story posted Wednesday (“Delta adopts Saudi ‘no-Jew’ fly policy”), the site details a series of letters exchanged between Delta officials and Joseph Lovitky, a Washington lawyer associated with the American Center for Law and Justice, a Christian advocacy group. The story also quotes former Republican Congressman Fred Grandy and his wife Catherine, who complained about the Delta alliance on a Boston radio talk show.

“It looks like Delta will be the first Shariah-compliant airline in the United States," Catherine Grandy said.

But while some of the accusations against Delta were at best exaggerated, the airline didn’t help itself with its passive and vague response, which consisted of little more than issuing brief written statements.

As public relations executive Brad Phillips noted on his blog, Delta initially issued a “boilerplate and totally unhelpful” response that didn’t directly address the alleged ban of Jewish passengers except to say,“visa requirements to enter any country are dictated by that nation’s government, not the airlines.”

Only after the story continued to grow did Delta issue a more specific response that stated the company’s non-discrimination policy and sought to distance itself from its Saudi partner. Delta said Saudi Arabian Airlines would not enjoy the same kind of reciprocal benefits extended to most other SkyTeam members, such as codesharing (allowing Saudi flights to carry Delta flight numbers) and letting Saudi Airlines passengers earn Delta frequent-flier miles.

Still, that did little to silence the airline’s critics. Illinois Republican Senator Mark Kirk -- citing the now-removed USA Today story -- called for a Federal Aviation Administration investigation. Meanwhile, the Anti-Defamation League called on Delta to ensure that neither it nor its partners facilitate discrimination, “whatever the regulations of Saudi Arabia.” The group issued similar appeals to other U.S. airlines that align themselves with carriers serving the Middle Eastern country.

Indeed, for all the misinformation and fury the Delta controversy generated this week, it does raise a legitimate subject -- whether U.S. corporations should partner with overseas companies or foreign governments that don’t uphold American values. That issue is much larger than a single company, single industry, or single foreign country. And this week’s breathless and hastily written stories failed to do it justice.